Classic Cars Deliver On Elegance And Value
Classic cars can be a hot investment for those who’ve chosen wisely, delivering gains over the past decade for those lucky few of more than 500 per cent. The most highly desired and legendary vehicles – think Ferraris and Aston Martins – last year were commanding prices in the 10s of millions of dollars.
Those stratospheric valuations go a long way to explaining why we rarely see such cars on the roads, here or overseas. Unless you visit classic car shows like Melbourne’s Motorclassica or the more lavish affairs offshore, you’ll rarely see such valuable vintage vehicles cruising the public byways. So when a set of special wheels makes itself available to be touched and admired – even sat in – by the general public, it’s an opportunity worth taking up, especially given how quickly automotive design, functionality and technology is moving ahead.
‘To be able to showcase privately-owned cars and some brand heritage in the store is, I think, very unique.’
The Mercedes-Benz W111, as it’s known, started production in 1969 selling for $19,000 at a time when Melbourne’s average house price was $11,400, according to Mercedes Me lead brand specialist Matt Bruce. He says a search for the model’s current value on the Mercedes-Benz “All Star” database yielded a price of 600,000 Euros ($A967,000) – but that was for a left-hand drive variant of the car which was “not so rare”. That, of course, throws this vehicle beyond the heady space of the $1m-mark.
Madam Wheels got experience how such a car might feel while it was parked this week front and centre in the Mercedes Me Store in Melbourne. It felt like a kid on a car ride in a games arcade.We didn’t get to drive it, however, which was perhaps no bad thing. The car’s roof and windows were down on what was Melbourne’s coldest day in May in almost 20 years – roughly the same amount of time it took Mercedes-Benz to make another four-seater cabriolet after the W111 in the W124.
An over sized cream steering wheel dominated the driver’s seat, leaving to the imagination the possibilities for a pilot unleashed on the roads.Mercedes’ Bruce says classic cars like the 280 SE are particularly popular in the Me Store.
“This is one of the few opportunities the average person will get to see cars like these for themselves,” Bruce says. “To be able to showcase privately-owned cars and some brand heritage in the store is, I think, very unique.”It’s an offering which resonates with the store’s audience, he says, which averages about 600 people a day stopping in for drinks, to dine or to participate in the store’s series of diverse lifestyle events. “They like to see concept cars, and the modern fleet but the heritage and the classics are timeless,” he says. “We love bringing in new communities and we’ve got the platform to really change perceptions about what the brand stands for and how innovative we are now.”
Overall, the 280 SE Cabriolet was a beautiful thing, with its wide red leather seats, luxuriously length and elegant lines. Never mind the lack of digital display, windows controlled with a button or heated seats/steering wheel/windscreen/center console/arm rest.
And of course it pre-dated parking sensors, adaptive cruise control, lane assist and any notion of autonomous driving. You’d be on your own in a drive like this. There in, perhaps, lies the appeal. That notion of being in total control, confident that one’s innate facilities need to be switched on. That’s what driving used to be about, after all. But that was then. This is now. The future awaits.
Related Articles
A field guide to the fine art of buying a car
I SPENT a Saturday morning just over a fortnight ago going car shopping with my niece. She’d decided she needs a car of her own and she thinks I know a bit about the subject, so she asked me to come along.
Jeep helps us hit the road with purpose and an Empty Esky
COVID-19-induced travel restrictions look like they’ll remain part of life for some time to come, especially by air. That’s bad news for those of us in Melbourne, particularly, still enduring months of enforced local isolation.
Hypercars evolve as same, same but different
I THINK most of us can agree that evolution is a pretty good theory. You might prefer to believe a divine entity created every living thing, all in a hurry, about 6000 years ago, in which case all power to you, even though you quite possibly regard